Brett Christophers, economic geographer: ‘In contemporary capitalism, the right to housing does not exist’

Brett Christophers, 55, has spent years studying the strategies of large corporations. He began by examining big investment banks such as JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs. But he soon noticed those names being pushed aside on the agendas of politicians and influencers by investment firms like BlackRock and Blackstone. It was not sudden: for decades they had quietly gained ground, and now control almost every aspect of a citizen’s daily life — the home they live in, the water they wash with, the road or railway they use to get to work, or the hospital they visit for an emergency. That is what Christophers, an economic geographer at the Institute for Housing and Urban Research at Uppsala University (Sweden), has been documenting in multiple studies and, more recently, in books such as Our Lives in Their Portfolios: Why Asset Managers Own the World and Rentier Capitalism: Who Owns the Economy, and Who Pays for It?.

This interview took place at the Barcelona Institute for Urban Research, where Christophers gave a lecture on housing, and it led to a subsequent conversation in the wake of a wave of public outrage sparked by the eviction of Maricarmen Abascal, who at 87 was forcibly evicted from her Madrid home by a real estate investment firm. A deep student of anti-capitalist movements, Christophers says he is nonetheless surprised by the resistance the funds have met among affected neighbors in Spain, and by the broad public rejection of treating people’s homes as financial products. “Housing has always been a financial asset. For many, the main one, if not the only one. But in recent years that balance has been broken.”

Question. Is Maricarmen’s eviction the result of housing becoming just another investment product?

Answer. Yes. The more often the market value of housing takes precedence over its use value, the more likely these situations become. That has been a key trend in recent decades, not only in Spain but worldwide. This case is a particularly striking example of a much broader phenomenon. And although it is especially shocking, the underlying dynamics are already a central component of contemporary urban social life in Spain.

Q. The Spanish government has rolled out a package of measures to prevent new cases like Maricarmen’s. There was talk of banning so-called “vulture funds” from buying homes, although the measure was eventually diluted. Would that ban have been enough?

A. Such a ban could blunt the sharpest edges of the problem, but it would not make it disappear. After all, there are many other types of investors that also engage in harmful practices, as Maricarmen’s case itself shows. The deeper problem is the extreme commodification of housing, together with a state that neither offers a meaningful alternative to the market nor regulates it effectively.

It is important to be honest about the scale of the challenge posed by cases like Maricarmen’s”

Q. But Spain enshrines housing as a constitutional right.

A. In practice it is not, because it is not guaranteed. The proof is that there are people who are homeless. In contemporary capitalism there is a right to buy housing, but not a right to housing. That right has been financialized.

Q. In recent years you have focused on unraveling the strategies of the funds. How have they evolved?

A. Their operation involves a manager investing other people’s money that previously went into stocks or bonds. But from the 1980s and ’90s they began buying real estate and key infrastructure on which society and our daily lives depend: energy, transportation, water, sewage. Since then, they decide who can use that infrastructure and how much they must pay.

Q. That major takeoff happened with the rise of neoliberal governments under Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. Was that a coincidence?

A. That was crucial. Neoliberalism’s guiding principle is that the public sector should do as little as possible because the private sector is supposedly more effective and efficient and that will make prices fall. But in the U.K., where almost everything has been privatized, prices have risen. And privatizations have only accelerated: 40 years ago those managers administered about $1 trillion globally. Today, more than $100 trillion.

Q. Follow the money: the savings of a teacher or a firefighter in Massachusetts end up invested in an apartment block in Madrid or Barcelona where neighbors are evicted. Are those savers aware of how their capital is being used?

A. It is true that if those investments perform well, the pensions of teachers and firefighters benefit. But I’m sure that teacher would not be very happy to know their gains come from higher rents and the eviction of people in Madrid or Barcelona. They do not know because, between one end and the other, the chain has many links.

Q. And how is the money distributed along that chain?

A. The firefighter or teacher does not receive it. Suppose a Blackstone fund has $1 billion. Of that, perhaps 2% comes from workers’ pensions. The rest comes, for example, from bank executives, who have more wealth, or even sovereign wealth funds, such as Saudi Arabia’s.

Q. You have studied the work of British Marxist geographer and social theorist David Harvey, who argues that modern cities have become vehicles for capital accumulation. Is the influence of the funds widening inequality in major cities?

A. Undoubtedly, inequality is growing and societies are more urban. And these actors act as custodians of the wealth of those who already own wealth. In today’s society, wealth is distributed very unevenly. These managers reproduce and amplify that inequality.

If capitalism ever falls, it will not be because of protests, but because of its internal contradictions”

Q. Maricarmen’s case has reignited protests in Spain. Could it be a catalyst?

A. Perhaps. But housing has already politically mobilized the population in Spain, including young people, for the last 15 years—maybe more than anywhere else in the world—and yet cases as severe as Maricarmen’s continue to occur. That is why I think it is important to be honest about the scale of the challenge.

Q. What role should activism play?

A. Protesting as an explicitly anticapitalist platform is counterproductive because it alienates allies who might sympathize with your concerns and because it is too broad and diffuse a target. Fighting capitalism is like trying to catch the wind. If capitalism ever falls, it will not be because of protests, but because of its internal contradictions as a way of organizing society.

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